


Collapsing Systems and Rioting Minds

by incrediblysincere



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: (ish?), Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Body Horror, Canon Autistic Character, Combat, Gen, Platonic Relationships, esp with platonic relationships, symmetra leaves vishkar, there need to be more zenyatta-focused fics, zen symm friendship is a force of nature, zenyatta helps everyone find their inner peace
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-24
Updated: 2017-04-24
Packaged: 2018-10-23 12:27:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,890
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10719345
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/incrediblysincere/pseuds/incrediblysincere
Summary: Tekhartha Zenyatta is getting old. Genji Shimada is finding happiness. Overwatch is saving the world.And Satya Vaswani hasn't known peace until this moment."When you looked at me in battle, I felt calm for the first time since... since longer than I can remember.”





	Collapsing Systems and Rioting Minds

Twenty years in this form and Zenyatta was already feeling like a bag of bolts. 

His faceplate had come loose the other day. Not wanting to reveal his signs of ageing to the other heroes, he’d screwed it back on himself, but the rest of the day he’d felt gloomy.

 _Worrying is not the path to transcendence,_ he reminded himself. _Age is merely a number to the Iris._

Still. An upgrade would be nice. Any way to keep him feeling like he might fall apart every mission Genji dragged him on.

And speaking of missions...

“Winston wants us to defend Gibraltar. Vishkar is infiltrating the area. I need you to back me up.”

“Genji...”

“I know how you feel about violence. But this organisation does harm. It is the only way.”

Zenyatta let out a short, mechanical sigh. “Very well, Genji. I will heal you.”

 

When they arrived at the watchpoint, Winston had already assembled as many heroes had replied to his call. Zenyatta waved and bowed at the familiar faces.

“Hello, Zenyatta!” Tracer saluted him with a cheery smile. “Joining us today?”

“Genji has persuaded me to.”

“Oh come on. We all know you secretly love it,” D.va chipped in, slipping out of her mech.

“I do believe Zenyatta does enjoy flinging his balls everywhere.”

“ _McCree.”_ D.va gave him a disapproving look, but she was giggling.

“How are ya, you old scrapheap?” 

Zenyatta bowed to the cowboy. “I’ve seen better days, McCree. We omnics do not suit aging quite as well as you do.”

“Aw, shucks.” McCree grinned. He was well used to Zenyatta’s subtle flirting. “But why’d you say that?”

“New technology is being built every day. Even though I have the blessing of the Iris on my side, sometimes I don’t feel quite as adept as others, like Orisa. I’m sure I’ll hold together on the battlefield, though.”

Orisa, the refurbished OR-15 unit, waved at Zenyatta. He offered her a warm ‘greetings’ in return.

“Need some fixing, omnic?” Torbjorn called, walking slowly to the monk.

“I am okay now. Thank you for the offer, Torbjorn.”

Their comms crackled and everyone fell silent to listen as Athena relayed orders into their earpieces.

“Vishkar has taken control of an area just outside the station. Our job is to get them away and prevent any of their architechs from infiltrating the watchpoint.”

“Everyone set?” Winston boomed to the group.

Nods and agreements bounded around the station as everyone readied their weapons.

Athena’s voice rang out again. “I will open the lower doors in 3... 2... 1...”

The team surged forward into the sunlight.

Zenyatta immediately lost sight of Genji, his student leaping forward on his light mechanical feet. Zenyatta stayed in the middle of the group.

The other healer, Mercy, fluttered behind on her own wings. Zenyatta had never particularly cared for her but he kept this opinion private, showing her as much kindness as he would any other. She was a skillful healer, and her distaste for war mirrored his own.

Zenyatta trained his eye on Genji as he scaled a wall before them. Taking aim, he launched an orb of harmony at his pupil. Zenyatta knew there was a 50% chance Genji was following directions from Athena in his earpiece.

The other 50% was that he had decided to run headfirst into the fight on his own. 

As they left the watchpoint, through a wide metal door, the Vishkar forces came into sight. Lagging behind the rest, Zenyatta watched as Genji and the other flankers moved silently around the corner.

Zenyatta’s best guess was that Vishkar had set up sentry turrets around the outside of the watchpoint. There were likely hard-light barriers too, set up by their expert Architechs.

Zenyatta wasn’t sure what Vishkar wanted with the Gibraltar base. He had never gotten too involved in the politics of Overwatch’s movements, instead focusing on how he could help people like Genji. If he could improve their minds and open them to the Iris, they would be blessed in battle.

“ZENYATTA, WATCH OUT!” Reinhardt charged before him, shielding him before he could move through the outer gate. As expected, several sentries trained on Reinhardt as he moved through the gate, but their piercing beams were soon taken down in a swing of his hammer.

Outside the gate, Vishkar’s presence here was obvious. Several prismatic hard-light structures sat in the fields around the outer fence, clearly living quarters for the combat architechs. They were protected by several barriers and hundreds of sentries.

Architechs had already assembled, lines of clean, identically-uniformed men and women, weapons at the ready.

Against Overwatch, the contrast was clear. 

Almost before Zenyatta was ready, the flankers had sprung on the outer rows of Vishkar soldiers. Zenyatta watched Genji zip through their ranks, his shuriken slicing through Architech armour.

Zenyatta let his eyes zip to McCree. The cowboy stunned an Architech with his flashbang, letting loose several shots at her head before she fell. Zenyatta was about to check on the others when he noticed another Architech behind McCree.

Mercy was occupied at the frontline and Mcree had rolled forward, not realising the danger behind him. Zenyatta trained his orb of discord on the Architech, then readied his orbs of destruction.

Before launching them forwards, he caught a fear in her eyes - a sudden look of vulnerability. It was a look Zenyatta knew well. He’d seen it before, on his pupil Genji, and it was the look of one conflicted.

Zenyatta could tell the Architech was torn inside, broken by her warring wants. As the orbs left his hands she turned away quickly, blinking. The orbs sailed past her.

Zenyatta returned the orbs to their levitating position around his body. With a shaking sight that rattled his cogs, he turned back to Genji again. He had taught Genji well and calmed the inner conflict, but sometimes the monk thought that Genji still felt at odds with his weaponised body.

Through a ringing in his head, Zenyatta eventually heard the orders Athena was urging into his circuits. Turning back to the fight, he launched his orb of harmony at Torbjorn as he set up a turret aimed at the Vishkar camps.

Many of the hard-light defenses were already broken down, but just as they crushed them, the Architechs would summon more. They were never-tiring craftspeople, conjuring what they needed from light.

Reinhardt called for healing so Zenyatta hurried towards where he was holding his barrier against the might of Vishkar. Zenyatta let a few destruction orbs fly as well as he could, taking down a few soldiers.

“Thank you my friend.” The harmony orb began restoring Reinhardt’s energy and Zenyatta made a quick look around for Mercy. His circuits were powering up to transcend, but he wanted her as backup.

D.va called for healing and Zenyatta began the treacherous trek deeper into the battleground. A Vishkar shield phased into his head, disorienting him; as he cleared his mind, he heard the deadly sound of a sentry turret setting fire to his machinery.

Turning, he attempted to get out of the way. He wasn’t fast enough, and with a heavy _clunk,_ parts inside him collapsed. His circuits were frying.

_I knew I was past this. I’m already breaking._

Zenyatta knew omnics could be rebuilt and made better, but he didn’t know if this was something he could come back from. The Shiny Vishkar technology was doing a number on his older model of a body, he thought as cogs in his head stopped turning.

_I must no longer occupy this form. A new, higher plane of existence will now be mine to explore forever._

Before his body shut down completely, Zenyatta felt something. Human hands. The sensation of movement - fast movement. Gunfire and jolting, panicked breaths, screams.

Then softness and silence. 

 

“Omnic. Wake up. Omnic. Please.”

Zenyatta kept his eyes shut. His body was too mangled to move.

The sound of a delicately accented woman’s voice and the strong sensation of something familiar had awoken him.

He still seemed to be occupying his omnic form. Still on this plane of existence? He hadn’t died?

“Who are you?” The words came out hideously broken, distorted through his fried voice box.

“Oh no. The sentry turret broke you. I’m so sorry.”

“Who are you,” Zenyatta repeated. He could practically feel the sparks jolting through his circuits as he struggled to speak.

“My name is Sat-- Symmetra. And you?”

“I am Zenyatta. Symmetra. That is a Vishkar name, is it not?”

There was a long pause. Zenyatta still couldn’t see, but he thought the woman might have moved.

“It’s not safe to talk here,” she said quietly. “May I get you some tea?”

Zenyatta didn’t say anything.

“You can’t drink. Of course.”

“Thank you for your kind offer. Did you save me?”

Symmetra clearly thought about this, deep shaky breaths punctuating her silence. “Yes. Yes I... I noticed you earlier in the battle and... forgive me. But I didn’t want to hurt you.”

“You are conflicted, aren’t you. About Vishkar?”

Another long pause.

“How did you know?” Her voice was barely audible through Zenyatta’s ringing ears.

“I had a student quite similar to you. His war was with the body he inhabits. Now, I think, he is nearly at peace with who he is.”

Zenyatta felt the proximity of Symmetra’s anxiety again. She must have moved closer.

“I have a prosthetic arm. It was kind of Vishkar to provide me with this. Very kind. But all it, and all my light gun produce, are violence. Against people and omnics like you. and...” 

Zenyatta let her pause to think, hearing her breathing becoming shakier.

“And when you looked at me in battle, I felt calm for the first time since... since longer than I can remember.”

“I believed I have reached enlightenment in that regard. But sometimes I do not feel at peace, and I cannot understand what troubles me.” Zenyatta’s voice had become more strained and distorted.

“I want to leave Vishkar.” Symmetra spilled this in a breath, like it had been itching to escape her.

“Then do it. I am willing to help you, as much as I am able in this state.”

“I don’t know where to go.”

Zenyatta let out a small chuckle, crackling through his smashed speaker. “Come to Overwatch.”

There was a heavy silence, the weight of Symmetra’s consideration of his words permeating the air.

“I’ll think about it.”

Zenyatta felt a warm, solid hand fall on what remained of his chest. The weight was a comforting reminder of the physical world, and everything he loved about it.

He wasn’t going to pass into the next plane. He was going to stay and help this woman find peace. In her he saw both a student and teacher, a friend and peer. 

“I’ll get Torbjorn to fix me. If you come to Overwatch you can meet him. He’s an engineer.”

“You’ll have to help me out. I don’t know how to leave without raising suspicion.”

The hand was still on his chest.

“It won’t be easy,” Zenyatta said. “But, nothing truly important is easy. Through difficulty we reach understanding.”

“Thank you, Zenyatta.”

“Thank you, Symmetra.”

“... Satya. My name is Satya Vaswani.”

Zenyatta felt a blossom of hope inside his fragile body. “Then thank you, Satya.”

**Author's Note:**

> This is actually the first Overwatch fic I've finished and the first fic I've EVER posted to Ao3!! I'm not 100% happy with the writing, but mostly I wanted to get this concept down. Zenyatta and Symmetra are incredible characters and I want more content about them as friends.


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